The AIDS epidemic is a disaster on many levels. In the most affected countries in sub-Saharan Africa, where prevalence rates reach 20 per cent, development gains are reversed and life expectancy may be halved. For specific groups of marginalized people – injecting drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men – across the world, HIV rates are on the increase. Yet they often face stigma, criminalization and little, if any, access to HIV prevention and treatment services. As this report explains, HIV is a challenge to the humanitarian world whose task is to improve the lives of vulnerable people and to support them in strengthening their capacities and resilience. Disasters, man-made and ‘natural’, exacerbate other drivers of the epidemic and can also increase people’s vulnerability to infection.
The World Disasters Report 2008 features:
The challenge of HIV and AIDS
The disaster of HIV
The humanitarian interface: using the HIV lens
HIV and population mobility: reality and myths
Refugees and the impact of war on HIV
Natural disasters: the complex links with HIV
HIV and AIDS funding: where does the money go?
Plus: photos, tables, graphics and index
Published annually since 1993, the World Disasters Report brings together the latest trends, facts and analysis of contemporary crises – whether 'natural' or man-made, quick-onset or chronic.
See commentary/opinion on the World Disaser Report at
www.ifrc.org/Docs/News/opinion08/08062601/index.asp